Portland Engagement Proposal - Ale & Julie

When Ale privately reached out to us to capture his Portland engagement proposal to Julie, we were in awe. Seriously, there is nothing like photographing a real proposal! Butterflies are everywhere from the person proposing, the photographer(s), and of course the person being proposed to! When Ale asked us to capture his proposal to his girlfriend Julie we immediately started brainstorming ideas. After long discussions about “how” to shoot this without being seen and keeping it intimate Ale decided to do his Portland engagement proposal outside along the Portland waterfront. The spaciousness of the outside was the best location since there were fewer people, the dynamic of the rain and the Fall leaves were also still vibrant.

The night before we scoped out a spot and found 3 benches immediately south of the Steel Bridge and sent Ale a GPS pin to the exact location of these benches along with a photo. Ale was flying in from San Diego and his girlfriend Julie was coming down from Seattle. Interesting, they fell in love in Seattle 3 days before Ale was moving to San Diego but since then they’ve been seeing each other 2 times every month. And this time it was Portland! Ale wanted to share a photo album of their relationship together then propose. The bench along the waterfront was the perfect spot. We positioned a tiny secret camera with a remote trigger just over the bench and an off-camera flash hidden in the tree. We also shot with a long lens from afar hiding behind trees. This gave us a very intimate view of the actual proposal without being seen (even rain-splattered our lens for the close-up feeling). Funny thing, just before Ale and Julie arrived another couple walked by with an umbrella. Since we had not met them yet we didn’t know if the other couple was them or not, and we started following them down the waterfront and across the bridge on the other side! What???! Luckily Ale texted us and let us know they were running late. Alas, they arrived and the magic began. Absolutely gorgeous! Nothing like the real thing!